I’ll start with coffins. They charge thousands for something that you either burn or put in the ground. What a rip off, when I kick the bucket I don’t even want a funeral. Just dispose of my body and have a party to celebrate my life.
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I’ll start with coffins. They charge thousands for something that you either burn or put in the ground. What a rip off, when I kick the bucket I don’t even want a funeral. Just dispose of my body and have a party to celebrate my life.
I said to my Wife just chuck me in the wheelie bin, arse up, I dont careQuote:
Originally Posted by lord bunberry
When my Mum and Dad passed within a few weeks of each other we were able to combine the two costs, roughly £8000 in total if I remember correctly as none of them had insurance we had to foot the bill for the cremations etc
Having Brothers and Sisters and some of whom worked and others that didnt was probably more emotionally challenging than the losses themselves
I could have afforded to pay the lot and have the kin pay me but as I didnt get on with one or two of them then I thought **** it, I left it to one of my Sisters to organise, I paid what I was due and left the rest of them to deal the rest balance, its ****ing costly enough without being left out of pocket by a couple of lazy *****
Agree with the coffins/funerals stuff, it's a joke that people are expected to pay so much to burn or bury a coffin.
Bottled water is another con, maybe in some places the tap water is crappy, but here it's fine.
Food shopping really annoys me the way manufacturers have really pushed prices sky high and also reduced the size and quantities they are providing compared to say a year ago. A couple of examples, McVities digestive biscuits, a twin pack was roughly £2.00 not so long ago now £3.00 and certainly feels like the size and quantity has reduced. Richmond Sausages which were in packs of 8 now packs of 6. There’s too many more to list.
My mate Geoff noticed that as well as his favourite spoons breakfast going up in price he was getting far less beans and only half a mushroom so he complained next time he was in.
He counted the beans, there were 18 and a tiny mushroom. The guy behind the bar wasn't that sympathetic but took the plate off him, a few minutes later it was back smothered in beans (cold) the same mushroom was there and he had lost his hash brown[emoji23]
He ate the lot and said nothing, a couple of weeks later the spoons was on their closures list. I don't think it had anything to do with giving away too many beans to tight erses though.
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I’m the same mate. I will be deid, I don’t want my family waisting money on a wooden box that they’re going to burn. I notice in other cultures they wrap the dead in robes and dispose of them. I’ll take the robes at a push.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bridge hibs
Thank you cards. I have a realistic alternative and that’s saying the words thank you in person. It’s not just thank you cards, there seems to be a card for almost everything these days.
I like a thank you card.Quote:
Originally Posted by lord bunberry
Quite a few people send my bairns Christmas and birthday presents that don't live in Edinburgh. We always send a text or make a phone call but I think a hand written note is a nice touch on top of that. I get it's not for everyone though.
I'm going to throw 'sales' into the mix. I worked in the warehouse at Next for 2 years whilst at uni and there were truckloads of stuff boxed in specifically for the sale. It was largely utter ***** that was unsellable. A handful of said items had been stuck in the back corner of the shops with the biggest floor space for the mandatory period to then claim the sale price was genuine. Stripped out again, boxed up and sent across the country marked as '50% off'. There was the odd genuine bargain (usually hoovered up by staff the night before) but most of the stuff had never been seen by anyone in the store before and wouldn't be seen again until the next Next sale. Sales are great of you genuinely find something you were going to buy at a reduced price. So much of it is manipulative marketing though designed to get you to spend £25 you never intended to because you are 'saving £25'. In that scenario you are really £25 down.
Don't even get me started on Black Friday.
Hope you don't get carried into the crematorium butt naked 😂Quote:
Originally Posted by lord bunberry
The tins of sweets (now plastic) that are sold at Christmas, Roses, Quality Street, Heroes, etc. The amount of chocolates and size of container is laughable compared to years ago, decreasing every year.
Up there with Easter Eggs and selection boxes for being a total rip off compared to buying the equivalent loose chocolate.
This did my head in when I was looking into covering the cost of planting/burning me, so my sister has as little as possible to do. Even the cheapest wooden coffin is expensive for what it is. So I looked into donating my body to medical science, I have lived in a teaching hospital city all my life, been poked and prodded by many a med student in my time so I thought they can have me as a cadaver when I croak it and save my sis doing anything! Turns out they only want healthy bodies, yeah it is weird but by all accounts they want fit bodies with no chronic illnesses, which rules me out straight away. I then remembered watching a documentary about a body farm, where entomologists study the insects on dead bodies to help with forensic science. So I looked into that, turns out there are no body farms in the UK, they are almost totally exclusive to the USA! So I ended up getting a small funeral plan, cardboard coffin, nae service, nae notices and a burning for a small amount per month. That even peed me off a bit because I have to get the largest coffin size because by all accounts cutting my feet off to fit me into a smaller one is "not a service that we can offer" by all accounts. It is an interesting thing to look into and grossly expensive if you let it be.Quote:
Originally Posted by lord bunberry
Begs the question though, why do we even have to go in a box whether cardboard, reed, wooden or ****ing made of cheese. Surely for even the basic cremation or burial they could just fire a sheet over you and be done with it, if that was your choice of course. Obviously about money, if folk chose that way then they would still find a way of screwing youQuote:
Originally Posted by Oscar T Grouch
I think it's just a tradition based on historical practice. There's no legal requirement to have a coffin for cremation in the UK, not sure about for burial. Whether individual crematoria would accept a body without a coffin of some sort I don't know.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bridge hibs
Historically western society held funerals several days after someone died, still do obviously, and the coffin provided protection for families preventing them witnessing decomposition. On cultures like Islam where burial takes place within 24 hours that wasn't and isn't necessary hence burial without a coffin being standard.
On top of all that we have to check out ourselves now, they really have us by the baws :hilariousQuote:
Originally Posted by Alfiembra
I hate those self service check outs with a passion, I nearly always try to avoid using them , especially as they're doing somebody out of a jobQuote:
Originally Posted by Gatecrasher
Boiler insurance - you pay £400-500 per year for a service. Especially when people insure brand new boilers. By the time they need even a part they could have had 2-3 new boilers with their insurance premiums.
😳Quote:
Originally Posted by Chuck Rhoades
You can get boiler cover for a fraction of that!
With an annual full service that’s a pretty average rate 😊. Much cheaper finding someone who can do this for you.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hibbyradge
Try an donate your body. No cost and helping science
I pay £12.99 pm for boiler cover and a service.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chuck Rhoades
https://hometree.comparethemarket.co...type=Homeowner
We got some new garden furniture delivered today. It came in several cardboard boxes, one of which my wife commented was "coffin sized". I've bagsied it if I die before it decomposes.
I’ve recently started working for boiler insurance for BG (I know everyone has bills to pay mind 😉) you would get full central heating cover with the service annually for about £340 with no excess to pay maybe down to £280ish with an excess, if ur already with them get on the phone every single renewal and they’ll move the price, there are other cheaper options as well as mentioned by others sometimes they come with an excess to pay so mins and check that, and the price will probably go towards the prices I’ve mentioned after your first year once they have a ‘profile’ of your boiler and age etc you can continue to move every year though taking up new customer type offers save you a couple hundred a year possiblyQuote:
Originally Posted by Chuck Rhoades
The inflation in car insurance…dunno why but mine seems to be looking like at least 50% higher this year! [emoji24]
Quote:
Originally Posted by RyeSloan
really hacks me off… I get the odds are shorter that something will happen with a given car as it ages over a year, but you’ve also got another year’s no claims, and the value of the car has depreciated
The car is two years old! I have no claims of over about 12 years yet my renewal quote was 65% higher.Quote:
Originally Posted by McD
Aye right I thought I’ll get a similar price to last year by doing a quick comparison…ermmm naw.
Following on from this: multicar/house/all in one policies from insurers. I saved £130 by ditching admiral and signing up to separate policies for 2 cars and the house. It took all of 5 more minutes by the time I’d phoned admiral to ask why our renewal premiums were higher than last year and then told them I won’t be renewing with them.Quote:
Originally Posted by RyeSloan
The energy standing charge is a complete rip off. Nearly doubled over the course of the energy crisis, but our infrastructure hasn’t changed one iota.
When prices drop do you think the standing charge will drop?
Will. It. ****.
And petrol still hovering at 1.43ish. Was about 1.10 a year or so ago. Okay it’s come down a bit but looks like 1.4 is the norm now.
All of these energy companies and supermarkets making huge profits whilst the normal working person struggles with all of these increases. It’s a sad state of affairs that it’s just allowed to happen
Not an expert in the matter, but I think our high standing charge is to cover those investors/companies that lost out when the power companies went bust over the last 2 years.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jones28
I can't think of another market like it whereby a company over extends itself, goes bust, and the costs get lumped on to the customers of the other more successful companies!
Quote:
Originally Posted by speedy_gonzales
Damn spot on ! What a weird set up, can't think of a more anti competitive state of affairs.
The former directors of these bust energy providers knew that the government would have to step in even before they went out of business....
similar to so many private OAP homes that went bust too. A real pet hate.
It’s not a problem over here (yet?), but tipping when you’re in the US is a massive con.
Standardised tipping. Not tipping if you’ve had good service, just tipping cos that’s the done thing.
I remember last year we went to Tiger Woods Popstroke, like a fancy mini golf place. The girl who we paid to get in literally clicked a few buttons on a screen, then handed us the balls. She got tipped $20 for it, by the guy we were with. I think it’s insane.
That pisses me off even more then. 60p a day to cover the ***** of incompetence and bad business practices.Quote:
Originally Posted by speedy_gonzales
Linked to that, the "service charge" added to your bill that is becoming more and more standard in restaurants here. Quite often it is more than the "standard" 10% tip as well. The fact they add it on but say that it is optional and you can ask for them to remove it is guilt tripping the customer to not ask for it to be removed/reduced as they know a lot of folk will be too shy to ask.Quote:
Originally Posted by easty
When that happens I ask the restaurant if the staff gets the money, if they say yes then I don't leave a tip, if they're unsure then I ask them to remove it and leave a tip.Quote:
Originally Posted by overdrive
The reason for large service charges and 'tips' in the US is because the serving staff receive such low wages. Basically, you're paying to top up the poor sod's salary because the business owners are so tight fisted.
My consumer related peeve is: Why the hell is food and drink so much more expensive in motorway service stations? Went to a Costa at a service station near Stirling recently and the prices were around 50% higher than in the Costa next to my office.
I always ask for it to be removed regardless, I like to tip the waiter who has served me personally with cash. It was a struggle to do this in Fazenda recently when about five different people tended to our table!Quote:
Originally Posted by J-C
Two tier prices in supermarkets is beginning to annoy me too.
Totally. This data mining should be illegal. How you can be held to ransom for not sharing your personal details is beyond me!Quote:
Originally Posted by Scouse Hibee
Replica football strips!! Glorified tshirts
That's strange. My renewal is due on 17th and One Call is offering the same cover as last year for an extra £6. Very happy with that.Quote:
Originally Posted by RyeSloan
The biggest ripoff in cars is the surcharge for premium paint. They must have gallons of paint in stock, £600 for a particular colour is a bit much.
I noticed Boots were doing it for medicine and plasters. That feels very wrong to me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Scouse Hibee
It used to always annoy me how my insurance renewal would be more than the previous year, I’d phone to cancel and they’d “see what they could do” and then miraculously they could offer me a better price. Do they just not bother with that any more? I just phoned to cancel my home insurance as it had jumped up about 35%, and there were no questions asked, they just went ahead and cancelled it straight away.
Madri beer. I wouldnt say a con more marketing genius.
Med lagers such Moretti, Peroni and San Miguel have stormed the market in recent years they are all owned by the big boys of course such as Heineken etc. Coors Molson didnt have a med beer in their portfolio so they effectively invented Madri and sold it to the masses as the "soul of Madrid". Dont know about Scotland but its everywhere in England.
Aye but do they actually sell it in Madrid though?Quote:
Originally Posted by Lancs Harp
No its all made in the UK at present. Its proved so popular we could see a situation where a British "Spanish" beer is imported into Madrid itself (would likely be brewed under license in Spain though just as San Miguel Moretti and Peroni are here)Quote:
Originally Posted by DH1875
Yep I had it in the pub before the Livi game through there, was the first time I had noticed it, few weeks later my local got it in, decent enough pint but I'm still on the TennentsQuote:
Originally Posted by Lancs Harp
Yeah not knocking the beer. Its a decent enough pint, not the best Ive ever had but certainly not the worse and very drinkable.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mon Dieu4
Madri is decent. Still think a gassy and cold pint of Tennants is hard to beat.
That happened to me too, with LV.Quote:
Originally Posted by Green Man
Madri isn't a 'con' IMO - it's bloody genius marketing.
New FCA Regs scuppered the ‘haggling’Quote:
Originally Posted by Green Man
You could say the same about prices at airports, train stations, even the fitba.Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith_M
Bottled water, incredible the amount spent on that in the UK. Mugs.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith_M
relatively captive audience. They gamble that most people either won’t know if there’s a supermarket or shops nearby, or can’t be arsed taking a longer detour and will just bite the bullet and pay the higher cost.
same with fuel, it’s always significantly more expensive at motorway services than in towns.
Personally I couldn't care less if Madri is hand made in a village in the foothills of Madrid or in a mass brewery in Burton.
If it tastes nice I'll drink it, if it doesn't I won't.
I'm the same, folk go on about Tennants being rank, I really enjoy sitting out in the sun with a cold pint of Tennants, each to their own with drink choicesQuote:
Originally Posted by Since90+2
I think Madri and Tennents probably show how important a story and a brand is to selling a beer, if some people think something is exotic they will be more forgiving of the product or at least more open to liking it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Allant1981
I think I've posted before about the beer tasting I went to years ago. There was 2 beers blind tasted and the 8 people present unanimously agreed that beer A was nicer than beer B. There was then a tasting of an Innis & Gunn whisky oak aged beer (which was their big product in their pre lager days) and a Tennents version of the same style. After tasting both there was a 6 v 2 split in favour of the I&G. The host then revealed that beer A, that everyone had agreed was better than beer B, was in fact the same Tennents beer they had just disliked compared to the Innis & Gunn which was, of course, beer B. Some people had seen the Tennents name and instantly judged the beer differently. At the time the 2 beers were brewed in the same brewery but the stories behind them were different and that makes a world of difference.
It will be the same with Madri. It's brewed in the same brewery as Fosters, if it has been branded as 'Fosters premium' it would have been a flop regardless of whether it tasted the exact same as it does now.
I love a pint of Tennents and I really couldn't care how much that upsets beer snobs. It's enduringly popular for a reason.
The sunburn on my nose and top of my head from yesterday confirms your point about Tennants! :greengrinQuote:
Originally Posted by Allant1981
Quote:
Originally Posted by tamig
True.
Biggest consumer con?
BREXIT!
Anti virus software.
I bought a McAfee one from Argos a month ago, it cost just over a tenner.
Part of the Ts&Cs was signing up to auto-renew. It didn't say how much so I did a bit of digging. Wasn't easy to find but eventually I found it was over £120!
I've jumped the hoops finding the auto renew on their website and no surprise I've turned it off. They asked why, "because the auto renewal price is bloody ridiculous!"
And cause the founder was an absolute raj!Quote:
Originally Posted by Jack
Kale.
Does anyone ACTUALLY like kale?
If its on the bill, does it get taxed?Quote:
Originally Posted by J-C
Fry it in some garlic & chilli oil, cant beat crunchy KaleQuote:
Originally Posted by Colr
Crispy Kale - chop roughly, massage with olive oil, sprinkling of salt then in a hot oven for 6-8 minutes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Colr
Great side dish or standalone snack, just like the crispy seaweed you might get from the Chinese takeaway.
It counts as taxable income for the employer, but the tip counts as a deduction, so the employer is taxed on the net amount.Quote:
Originally Posted by Colr
It's the same net effect if it's not on the bill. The employer gets taxed on the net amount.
Either way, the tip is taxable income for the staff. Most restaurants operate a tronc system, whereby tips are pooled and shared. Tax is deducted from each staff member's share.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CropleyWasGod
Unless you work at Le Gavroche where the 13% service charge goes to the owner, Michel Roux Jr (formerly of Masterchef), and none of it goes to the serving staff.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeands...ge-le-gavroche
Try cavolo nero – it's like kale except that it tastes nice.Quote:
Originally Posted by Colr
Kale is about the only veg everyone in my family will eat when I put it on the plate.Quote:
Originally Posted by Colr
Maybe we are weirder than I thought.
Yes. Love it. Tried growing it this year but unfortunately the slugs love it too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Colr
I really like making a champ with it in. Potatoes boiled with skins on. Some butter, creme fraiche, grated cheddar and Parmesan with some kale. Lightly mash!
It is indeed the king of kale (it is what I’m growing) but other kale is acceptableQuote:
Originally Posted by nonshinyfinish
My favourite winter meal in Germany. The recipe below is OK but I wouldn't use just any sausage, it would need to be smoked and the same with the bacon, I'd try and replace that with a smoked pork chop or failing that a thick piece of gammon.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pretty Boy
https://germanculture.com.ua/main-dishes/grunkohl-mit-pinkel-kale-with-sausage/?amp=1
I love Chinese seaweed, but someone said it was mostly cabbage. Why is it they put on the top of itQuote:
Originally Posted by speedy_gonzales
It’s all cabbage/crispy greens, no actual seaweed what so ever.Quote:
Originally Posted by Billy Whizz
That does look a proper winter warmer. A good Saturday night meal when you get in cold from the football. I'll definitely be trying it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hibrandenburg
It’s still fantastic. What are the bits on the top, they make it tastyQuote:
Originally Posted by Scouse Hibee
Had that on a breakfast this morning.Quote:
Originally Posted by speedy_gonzales
Utter *****!